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Review: Arcanum Unbounded: The Cosmere Collection
Arcanum Unbounded: The Cosmere Collection by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 5 of 5 stars The first book I started in 2019! I started reading it yesterday while working on photos (sometimes writing metadata to the files takes a little bit so I wanted to have some reading to do while waiting). That evolved into me…
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Review: What is Obscenity?: The Story of a Good For Nothing Artist and her Pussy
What is Obscenity?: The Story of a Good For Nothing Artist and her Pussy by Rokudenashiko My rating: 4 of 5 stars I first heard about Ms. Rokudenashiko on the Daily Show years ago. A couple years ago I remembered her story and added the book to my wishlist. In 2018 I got it for…
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The Kobo Clara HD
Almost exactly 9 years ago I got a Nook after rethinking my prejudices against ebooks. Four years ago, I started using Calibre to manage my ebooks. Back then I had 324 ebooks. Now I’ve got 1396. A big difference from 9 years ago is that I don’t use the dedicated ereader as much as I…
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2018 in Books
This year I continued last year’s trends of reading cook books and stories I’d purchased as part of a Humble Bundle or Story Bundle. This led to some great surprises like Singularity Girl, which I really liked and Kissing Booth Girl which had a bunch of haunting short stories. Because it was the 200th anniversary,…
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Reviews: Babylon’s Ashes; Katamari Damacy; Milk Street: Tuesday Nights: More than 200 Simple Weeknight Suppers that Deliver Bold Flavor, Fast; Zeroes; Oathbringer; Nightflyers & Other Stories; Legends of Texas Barbecue Cookbook: Recipes and Recollections from the Pit Bosses; The Alloy of Law; Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania; A Planet for Rent ; Adrift on the Sea of Rains; Shadows of Self; The Bands of Mourning; Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell; Cook’s Illustrated Magazine 2018
Babylon’s Ashes by James S.A. Corey My rating: 4 of 5 stars This book is probably the most direct sequel so far in The Expanse. It pretty much picks up right where the last one left off (not counting the interstitial novella). One thing JSAC use for great effect in this book (and I think…
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Reviews: Muffins & Biscuits: 50 Recipes to Start Your Day with a Smile; Storm Front; Skin Deep; The Vital Abyss; The Marshal’s Lover; Dinner Illustrated: 175 Meals Ready in 1 Hour or Less; The World’s Most Dangerous Geek: And More True Hacking Stories
Muffins & Biscuits: 50 Recipes to Start Your Day with a Smile by Heidi Gibson My rating: 3 of 5 stars Written by the owner of a bakery, this book has relatively easy-to-follow recipes and beautiful photos of the muffins and biscuits. I’ve made one biscuit recipe in here and it’s already a staple of…
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Reviews: The Future is Japanese: Science Fiction Futures and Brand New Fantasies from and about Japan; Cibola Burn; Edgedancer; Sixth of the Dusk; The Virtuous Feats of the Indomitable Miss Trafalgar and the Erudite Lady Boone; The Churn; Altered America: Steampunk Stories; Dungeon Hacks: How NetHack, Angband, and Other Roguelikes Changed the Course of Video Games; Nemesis Games; Legion
The Future is Japanese: Science Fiction Futures and Brand New Fantasies from and about Japan by Masumi Washington My rating: 3 of 5 stars Another anthology. As usual, I’ve included my status updates with some spelling fixes. Overall it was a very uneven collection in terms of what I enjoyed. The stories all seemed to…
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Review: An Election
An Election by John Scalzi My rating: 3 of 5 stars A fun little short story about an election in a very diverse district. I kind of want to see more of this world which I think is the mark of a good short story. View all my reviews
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Review: You’re Not Fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop: Scalzi on Writing
You’re Not Fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop: Scalzi on Writing by John Scalzi My rating: 3 of 5 stars If you are an aspiring writer, Scalzi tells it like it is and gives you a good feeling for what it might be like to be a modern writer. No…
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Review: White Sand, Volume 1
White Sand, Volume 1 by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 3 of 5 stars It’s very odd reading a Sanderson comic rather than a prose book. So much of what’s great in his books involves the background information and the inner monologues of the characters. That said, it is neat to see a visual representation of…
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Review: Neon Noir: A Delilah Street Paranormal Investigator Anthology
Neon Noir: A Delilah Street Paranormal Investigator Anthology by Carole Nelson Douglas My rating: 1 of 5 stars This book might be for you. It was most assuredly not for me. The world was OK, but three things kept me from enjoying it: – The reveals or answers to the cases seemed to come out…
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Review: The Way of Kings
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 4 of 5 stars I want to start off by thanking Tor.com for being DRM-free. It’s great to see a major publisher doing this. With that out of the way, this was a massive story. It’s quite a different pace from everything I’ve read so far…
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Review: The Complete Cook’s Country Magazine 2017
The Complete Cook’s Country Magazine 2017 by America’s Test Kitchen My rating: 4 of 5 stars Halfway through 2017 the magazine underwent a visual revamp to modernize the look. I think it works fairly well. What I continue to enjoy about Cook’s Country is the back half which is both educational and contains tailored sections…
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Review: Mega Man 3
Mega Man 3 by Salvatore Pane My rating: 4 of 5 stars As usual for this series, it’s a combination of a history of the game covered and an autobiography of author. Although I never played Megaman 3 (or played very little of it) I did own Megaman 2 and so it was great that…
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Review: Ready Player One
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline My rating: 2 of 5 stars When it comes to my experience of this book, there are a few things that marred my enjoyment. When I first heard of it and didn’t know all the info about it I did by the time I actually read it, it sounded…